By Jim Harper
New Hampshire was the state where the “REAL ID rebellion” got its start. There, in 2006, Rep. Neal Kurk (R-Weare) took to the floor of the New Hampshire House to talk about his principled opposition to the federal national ID law. In stirring words, Kurk urged his colleagues to overturn a committee recommendation that no [...]
Cardless National ID and the E-Verify Rebellion is a post from Cato @ Liberty – Cato Institute Blog
By Jim Harper
Because all of us are with ourselves all day every day, we naturally tend to think that our own lives are pretty standard fare. But that’s just not so in a country of 300+ million people ranging over a vast expanse. So I found worthwhile this NPR story on people who don’t have IDs, people [...]
Photo ID Laws Mean Some Won’t Vote is a post from Cato @ Liberty – Cato Institute Blog
By Jim Harper
…on the Google privacy policy change.
The idea that people should be able to opt out of a company’s privacy policy strikes me as ludicrous.
Plus she embeds a valuable discussion among …
Kashmir Hill Has It Right… is a post from Cato @ Liberty – Cato Institute Blog
By Jim Harper
The House of Representatives is poised to make great strides forward in transparency, and our work over the last year aims to help them do that. Here’s how this spreadsheet …
Helping the House Advance Data Transparency is a post from Cato @ Liberty – Cato Institute Blog
By Jim Harper
News that incautious comments on “tweeter” got British tourists excluded from the United States had Twitter alight yesterday. (Paperwork given to one of the two, on display in this news …
‘Destroy America’ = Suspicion Fail is a post from Cato @ Liberty – Cato Institute Blog
By Jim Harper
In last night’s State of the Union speech, President Obama called for tax law reforms he says we need. Cato scholars have their doubts about much of what was in the speech, but my interest was piqued by the fact that he said, “Send me these tax reforms, and I will sign them right away.” [...]
Sunlight Before Signing, Year Three is a post from Cato @ Liberty – Cato Institute Blog
By Aaron Ross Powell
Over at Libertarianism.org I have a new blog post on the lesson the technology community should have learned from their campaign against SOPA. Imagine you’re an expert in some field of technical knowledge. Your field impacts quite a lot of people but most of them don’t understand the details the way you do. One day, [...]
SOPA and Skepticism is a post from Cato @ Liberty – Cato Institute Blog
By Jim Harper
He’s not unrestrained, but Larry Downes sees the remarkable downfall of legislation to regulate the Internet’s engineering as a harbinger of things to come. Jerry Brito, meanwhile, tells us “Why We Won’t See Many Protests like the SOPA Blackout.” They’re both right—over different time-horizons. The information environment and economics of political organization today are still [...]
SOPA/PIPA: Harbinger or Aberration? is a post from Cato @ Liberty – Cato Institute Blog
By Jim Harper
Does a more careful reading of the Supreme Court’s decision in U.S. v. Jones turn up a lurking victory for the government? Modern media moves so fast that the second-day story happens in the afternoon of the first. The Supreme Court ruled unanimously Monday morning that government agents conduct a Fourth Amendment search when they [...]
The Second-Day Story on U.S. v. Jones is a post from Cato @ Liberty – Cato Institute Blog
By Julian Sanchez
As I noted on Friday, the seizure of popular cyberlocker Megaupload demonstrates that, even without controversial new legislation, our government already has extraordinarily broad powers to take down U.S.-registered websites (including any site in the .com and .org domains) before anyone has been tried for illegal conduct, let alone convicted. While the evidence presented in [...]
The Megaupload Chilling Effects Hit is a post from Cato @ Liberty – Cato Institute Blog
